


Das Spiel mit dem Feuer

by Howwwever



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Caleb Widogast Deserves Nice Things, Caleb Widogast Needs a Hug, Caleb Widogast is a Mess, Caleb Widogast's Backstory, Gen, Hurt Caleb Widogast, Mighty Nein as Family, Protective Nott | Veth Brenatto, Trent Ikithon Being an Asshole
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-23
Updated: 2020-10-08
Packaged: 2021-03-05 03:27:21
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,627
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25463953
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Howwwever/pseuds/Howwwever
Summary: !On Hiatus!It hurt.He knew that it hurtit had to hurt. He had seen the flames, had felt them as they were rushing through his veins, fleeing out of his fingers. He had tasted the smoke, climbing up his nose and filling his mouth, his lungs. But still, despite his best efforts to feel the pain, all that reached him, truly reached him, was an all-surrounding, all-consuming numbness.The pain, he thought, would be helpful at least. Maybe, if it was only strong enough, if it burned his skin and pierced through his body with every lingering breath, maybe then he would be able to feel the rest of it too. Pain could be a powerful tool, he knew that better than most people. Sometimes, and he knew that better than anyone, pain came with knowledge.And knowledge was the one thing he craved at this moment, more than anything.
Relationships: The Mighty Nein & Caleb Widogast, Trent Ikithon & Caleb Widogast
Comments: 11
Kudos: 125





	1. It hurts

**Author's Note:**

> This is the first time in years I am writing fanfiction.  
> I might be out of practice to try to match someone elses characters, but things are complicated at the moment and I remembered how good writing fanfiction could feel. More than that, this story scares me because it is not only way out of my comfort zone, it is also entirely written in English.  
> My first language is German (Zemnian) and I am doing my best to not make any major mistakes.  
> Also I would like to give a Spoiler Warning for Caleb's Backstory, as this story will focus on that.  
> I hope you enjoy this.

# Das Spiel mit dem Feuer

### It hurt

It hurt.  
He knew that it hurt _it had to hurt_. He had seen the flames, had felt them as they were rushing through his veins, fleeing out of his fingers. He had tasted the smoke, climbing up his nose and filling his mouth, his lungs. But still, despite his best efforts to feel the pain, all that reached him, truly reached him, was an all-surrounding, all-consuming numbness.  
The pain, he thought, would be helpful at least. Maybe, if it was only strong enough, if it burned his skin and pierced through his body with every lingering breath, maybe then he would be able to feel the rest of it too. Pain could be a powerful tool, he knew that better than most people. Sometimes, and he knew that better than anyone, pain came with knowledge.  
And knowledge was the one thing he craved at this moment, more than anything.

_Stand up._

A voice. He was not sure where it came from. Possibly his own thoughts, trying to catch up with him. It would not be the first time that he felt so dissociated from his own mind that his thoughts felt more like the words of a stranger. Or maybe it was a stranger, talking to him. That seemed unlikely. He wasn't sure why it seemed unlikely. Did he recognize the voice? 

_Stand up, Bren. Es wird Zeit._

It was time. Time for what? He wasn't sure. But something deep inside of him, an urge deeper than an instinct, deeper than a thought, told him to obey. It was only at this moment that he realised that he had been kneeling on the floor. Where was he?  
He stood up, came to his feed with slow movements, trying his best not to fall again, which was hard, because his limbs still felt numb. And so did his mind. His eyes started to look around, searching the room... it was not a room. He was standing outside, his eyes found trees and grass... a forest.  
A sudden flash of uneasiness reached him. He did not remember how he got here and that troubled him. He should be able to remember it. He wasn't used to not remembering that sort of thing. 

_Good. You did that well._

He realised two things. One, the voice was not his own and two, it did come out of his own mind. Those realisations were troubling. Not more or less troubling than his state of disorientation, but still. He stumbled back, his fingers grabbing one of the trees behind him like a reflex. Grabbing it, holding on to it tightly, to keep from falling. Where was the fire?  
Before... that had been a fire. Flames of a deep orange that had whispered to him and had stretched out it deadly feelers to burn and kill and burn and kill... until there was nothing left. But now, in this forest, there were no flames. Apart from a small one, not even worth to be called a fire...a dying campfire. “Caleb?”  
He flinched. He had not noticed that he was not alone, he should have noticed that. Now it seemed obvious. There were people here, at least four of them, asleep on the ground. Probably more, it was dark and he couldn't see well. Now he glanced down, to the small creature that had spoken. Spoken to him? “Caleb, are you alright?”  
The little green goblin looked up at him, her face worried. The way she was speaking was soft, softer than he had expected from such a creature. Somehow, it calmed him. At least a little bit.  
He didn't answer. Even if he had wanted to, he could not think of a single word to say. Just the attempt to talk took too much of his concentration and he realised way too late, that he was sinking against the tree behind him, sliding down onto the ground. Helpless.  
The goblin came closer to him now, closer than he wanted her to, but his throat was still not following his wishes and so he was not able to tell her that. She climbed in his lap, with nothing he could do to stop it, and placed her hands carefully on his face.  
“You have to breathe, Caleb. Can you hear me? Breathe.”  
Again, despite of not having the slightest idea about what was going on, he followed the command. Taking a deep breath, he couldn't help but asking himself how much time had passed, since the last time he had taken a breath. The confusion was starting to choke him, but now that his lungs were filled with fresh air, he wanted more. And so he took sharp and quick breaths. His heartbeat quickened for a moment. His hands were shaking, his fingernails scratching along his arms as the pain finally reached him. Oh and how right he had been before... It did hurt.  
A burning sensation, that slowly scurried up his wrist, moved along his arms and left nothing but a liquid fire that penetrated his skin and hurt... his fingers piercing deeper into the skin. In a desperate attempt to relieve the pain, he wrapped his hands around the bandages that were around his arms and pulled, to remove them.  
“Don't.”, the goblin said, even softer than before and lifted her hands from his face, to put them in his own hands instead. She held his hands, in an act of empathy and love. She was right, he knew she was. He did not deserve to relieve the pain. The pain was his punishment and it was unfair of him to try to weaken it.  
“It hurts.”  
He was not aware that he had spoken until the goblin answered him.  
“I know it does. It's gonna be okay. I promise.”  
“Ich bin müde.”, he murmured quietly to himself. Every word that came out of him hurt, his own voice sounded rough in his ears. Rougher than usual? He was tired. Very tired, too tired to question everything. Too tired to question where he was or who he was or who those other people were, that were laying around him.  
“I should rest.”, he added, in common now. And while the little creature in front of him agreed and tried to lay him back down on the ground by gently pushing his shoulders in the right direction, someone else protested.  


_Now is not the time to rest. You have to get up._

And just like that, he jumped up to his feet again. Louder this time, with more energy than before. From the corner of his eye he saw movement, one of the sleeping people must have sensed the disturbance.  
“What's going on?”  


_You have to run, Bren. Lauf._

Bren. A name... his name? Something about it felt off, but he couldn't say what exactly it was. A shiver went over him, as his body started to tremble. He had to go, he had to run. “Hey, Caleb. Hey.”  
Someone was standing in front of him, snapping their fingers, trying to get his attention. He blinked. A woman with sun-kissed skin and dark hair, shaved into an undercut and tied into a topknot. His eyes met hers and he felt panic cursing through his thoughts. Caleb. Another name. He had no time to think about that. He needed a plan. An escape plan?  
“He isn't responding. Should we wake the others?”  
Was there a way for him to just leave? Would these people follow him?  


_These are not your friends, Bren. They won't let you go. You know what you have to do._

Oh, yes.  
Bren knew what to do. His mouth twitched into a smile. He knew exactly what to do.


	2. From one second to the next

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> From one second to the next, the confusion disappeared into the thin air around him, leaving nothing but a bitter aftertaste on his tongue. Bren suddenly knew where he was and he knew what he was doing. And while he felt the magic inside of him, following his command and his will without an effort, the voice was clearer to him than before, clearer than anything else.
> 
> _They are traitors of the empire, Bren. Du weißt, was du zu tun hast._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was so happy to see the reactions to my last chapter.  
> Thank you all so much!

### From one second to the next

From one second to the next, the confusion disappeared into the thin air around him, leaving nothing but a bitter aftertaste on his tongue. Bren suddenly knew where he was and he knew what he was doing. And while he felt the magic inside of him, following his command and his will without an effort, the voice was clearer to him than before, clearer than anything else.

_They are traitors of the empire, Bren. Du weißt, was du zu tun hast._

Indeed, he knew what he had to do. Traitors of the empire were dangerous, he knew that. They would not stand a chance against him and his training, he knew that too.  
Those people, those traitors, they were talking to him, but he couldn't have paid less attention to them. Their screams were muffled, their begging did not reach his ears, their cries so irrelevant that he could not even be bothered to make an attempt to understand them. They had to be punished and he was the one, who had to do it.  
Bren raised his hand, quickly, but not quickly enough. A hard punch hit him in the guts, before he could get the spell out that he had prepared and he blinked, a distressed groan escaping from his lips. They were attacking him.  
He looked up and it was the woman he had seen before, standing over him with her fist high up, ready to strike again.  
“Caleb, man. Snap out of it.”  
She did not make any sense. His name was not Caleb, there was nothing he could snap out of. But of course, he thought, she didn't make any sense. She was a coward and a renegade and it was not surprising that she was crazy too. Still, something about what she said to him, mixed with the look of fear and sadness she fixated him with, let him hesitate for a second.  
A second that was long enough for someone else, someone he had not seen yet, to sneak up behind him, out of the shadows, and grab his arms. Bren started to fight back, but whoever was standing behind him was stronger than he was, and he didn't manage to get his hands free to use his magic... he was stuck. He turned in the grip, his breath faltering and hectic, as his feet kicked against the hard, dry earth beneath him. There was no way out.

_They will kill you. You cannot trust them. Fight._

Someone grabbed his chin. It was the woman, turning his face into her direction, forcing him to look at her.  
“Dude, what's wrong with you?”  
Nothing was wrong with him. Bren stayed quiet.  
There was nothing he could say, to convince these people, who were clearly ill and mad, that he was not the one who had something wrong with him. He was a proud soldier and these people, they were scum. He had nothing to say to them.  
So Bren said nothing, doing his best to not flinch under the sceptical observations of his opponent.  
“Caleb, I swear to everything, if you don't start talking to me...”, she did not get to finish her, surly ridiculous, threat. A deep voice of the person behind Bren, who still held him in a firm grip, interrupted her.  
“Hey. Let's all calm down.”  
The woman scoffed, but her hands let his chin go. At least that.“Calm down, Fjord? Really?”  
Bren's eyes wandered off. There was the little goblin, he vaguely remembered talking to her earlier. Behind her, there was a little Tiefling, whose blue skin glowed in the silver moonlight and next to her there was a second Tiefling, this one vibrant purple and taller. Further behind there stood another woman, a tall, muscular woman with braided hair, black but fading to white at the tips.  
“Caleb.”  
That was the goblin again. She looked up to him with big, yellow eyes. A soft smile curled around her terrifying teeth.  
“Caleb, you are okay. You are safe.”  
Something about this, and he wasn't sure what it was, got to him. Was it the words, the tone in which they were spoken, or the look of desperate sorrow?  
Caleb froze.  
He stopped moving, stopped fighting back immediately. It became quiet for a moment, as the only sounds that had existed in his ears before, his rapid breathing and his body trying to break free of this grip... vanished. His eyes grew wider, as he looked at the faces of his friends in horror.  
Caleb wanted to say something, anything, but his tongue was frozen just like the rest of him was. What the hell had just happened?  
He didn't know, didn't understand and didn't want to understand either. He was scared, scared to death to say the least and now, even though he realised why Fjord was holding him, pushing his arms onto his body, there was nothing he wanted more than to run. Not run away, not to flee, not like he thought he had to, a couple of moments ago. Caleb wanted to hide, hide in the comforting black of the tall trees around them.  
“Lass mich... let me go...”, he managed to press out this one thought, knowing that it was hopeless, knowing that his friends had to maintain him, had to tie him up maybe even, to keep themselves safe. Because he, Caleb, he was a danger to each and everyone of them.  
“Are you gonna try to attack us again, if Fjord let's you go?”  
Beau raised an eyebrow, slowly letting her hands fall back into a relaxed position.  
Caleb shook his head.  
“Nein...”, he muttered, silently, not wanting to make too much noise, “I will not.”  
Of course not, he thought.  
Beau did not seem entirely convinced, which was fair. She didn't trust him and she should not trust him. He had just proven himself to be far from trustworthy.  
How was that even possible? Just yesterday, everything had been fine. More than fine, Caleb remembered, he had had a good day. Which was rare.  
They had been travelling around, on the road he had had a lot of time to read and study. Then it had gotten dark, they had set up camp, he had offered to take first watch and after that he had gone to sleep... and that was the last thing he could make sense of.  
“Let him go, Fjord.”  
Nott crossed her little arms and glared up at Fjord. Caleb saw Beau, who just nodded slightly and in the next moment, with no one to hold him up any more, he plummeted to the ground.  
He heard Jester screeching his name, but Nott was there first, to carefully sit him up again.  
“Are you okay, Caleb?”  
No. He was not okay, he was obviously not okay.  
His head was pounding to the beat of his own heart, the blood was rushing through his veins, leaving hints of a burning pain and his mind was filled with fear and confusion.  
But as he raised his head to look at Nott, and as he saw the anxiety in her, he could not bring himself to say anything else but: “Ja...ja. I'm okay.”  
It was a lie, everyone knew that it was a lie. They let it slide.  
Nott carefully brushed his face with the outside of her hand. Caleb was now kneeling in front of her, his knees buried in the earth that he had been kicking around just a few seconds ago.  
It was freezing cold, his skin felt as if it was hit by thousand needles with every stroke of wind that hit him, but at the same time as he shivered, sweat was dripping from his forehead.  
There was a heat inside of him, deep inside of him. And it burned him, burned him alive from inside and his breath was shaky and his lungs were not filled with enough air and he thought he was gonna faint, was gonna die maybe...  
“Do you need to rest?”  
That was a complicated question. Caleb wanted to rest. All he wanted to do was close his eyelids for a moment, lay back down and lose himself in the emptiness of a dreamless sleep. He also knew that none of that was possible. Beau seemed to agree.  
“No way. Shit, I mean. I don't know, Caleb. What if you wake up and get all weird on us again?”  
There was a short flash of anger that flew over Nott's eyes. Caleb gave himself one second to catch his breath, before nodding.  
“Ja... of course. You are right, Beau.”  
His limbs were still shivering, but Caleb managed to get up on his feet again, his hands holding onto his own arms.  
“So what?”, Fjord looked at Caleb with, what he could only describe as a mix of pity and fear. “You're never gonna sleep again? I doubt that that would work for a very long time. Shouldn't we think about another solution?”  
Fjord was right, of course he was. But those were questions Caleb didn't want to think about. Because those questions lead to other questions, bigger ones that were more difficult to answer. Asking for a solution was asking about the origin. What the hell had happened to Caleb? How was that possible? Would it happen again? _What the damn hell had happened to him?_  
“I don't know, it's the middle of the night guys. What are we gonna do about it now? He doesn't seem to know what that was either, or do you?”  
The last part of Beau's question was directed towards Caleb, who shook his head.  
“Caleb has to sleep, though. Maybe like, not right now, but at some point though. Humans do need to sleep.”  
Jester sounded worried. Caleb didn't like that.  
He did not want the others to worry about him, what good would that weight on their mind do to anyone? It was too much, the looks, the voices, the silent yet very present thoughts they all shared. Caleb took another deep breath, doing his best to stop from shaking.  
“It is fine. I will not go back to sleep tonight and in the morning we can think about what to do, ja? Maybe…”  
Caleb was interrupted by Jester and frankly, he was glad about it. His next sentence would have been a lot more problematic and he didn’t have the strength or motivation to have an argument right now.  
“But.... we do not know if, whatever happened to you Caleb, will only happen if you are sleeping, do we? I mean… was it magic? Like a spell… or was it just a bad dream that you did not snap out of fast enough? I think that would change things, depending on which one it is and even if we knew, you know. Like I said. I think we have to do something now, right?”  
Caleb sighed. Then he looked down, when he heard a loud purring noise from below and saw Frumpkin, who had come out of his hiding spot, now that things had calmed down, and was now bumping his head against Caleb’s legs, in a wonderfully affectionate gesture. Caleb picked Frumpkin up from the ground and held him closer to his body, just to have something to hold on to.  
“Well, what are we gonna do?”, Beau said, in a reply towards Jester, “It is dark, we are in the middle of fucking nowhere. The next town is at least two or three days worth of travel away and even if we reach it. Then what?”  
Molly was just standing there, observing the conversation silently.Yasha did the same. But while Yasha was just, well Yasha, Caleb wasn’t used to seeing that Tiefling being this quiet. Something about it upset him.  
This whole situation was upsetting.  
His heart started thumping, he could hear it. He could hear his blood passing through his ears and the cat in his hands starting trembling. It came way too quickly, way too unprompted. Caleb’s eyes fixated on the silent silhouette of Molly, while his vision became blurry and it was so cold and so hot and sweat started to run down his back, more so than before.  
The voices of his friends, arguing and talking to each other, slipped into the background, became too indistinct to understand, turning into a single hiss. His vision got darker and even more blurry… nausea creeped up his stomach. He closed his eyes shut, pressing his eyelids together until he started seeing bright sparks, but they also twisted and turned and his head started hurting.  
Someone said his name. Or at least he was guessing so, he _heard something_ but it wasn’t loud enough and it wasn’t good enough and everything was…

Without being able to finish this last thought he dropped onto the cold earth once more, laying motionless, unconscious, trapped alone, in the dark.


	3. It wasn't dark at all

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Wrong. It wasn't dark at all.  
> The first thing Caleb noticed was the brightness of his surroundings. A vibrating, pulsating light that seemed to radiate from no particular direction and at the same time from every single one of them. He did not even have to open his eyes, he didn't want to.  
> He was sure that, as soon as he opened his eyes to look around, the shining light would blind him. His fingers traced the cold and smooth surface underneath him, as he tried his best to sit up. He straightened his back and took one deep breath.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so happy, reading all of the comments and getting so much love!  
> Thank you so much.  
> I know that this chapter is short, I am so sorry. But I hope it is somewhat okay nevertheless.

### It wasn't dark at all.

Wrong. It wasn't dark at all.

The first thing Caleb noticed was the brightness of his surroundings. A vibrating, pulsating light that seemed to radiate from no particular direction and at the same time from every single one of them. He did not even have to open his eyes, he didn't want to.  
He was sure that, as soon as he opened his eyes to look around, the shining light would blind him. His fingers traced the cold and smooth surface underneath him, as he tried his best to sit up. He straightened his back and took one deep breath.  
He remembered losing consciousness… So was this a dream? One of his hands layed down over his face, almost instinctively. It was too bright. The light was too damn bright. It caused him to have a headache. Where was he now?  
At this point, maybe he should just stop asking questions. Nothing that had happened to him in the past few hours had made any sense. 

Caleb came to his feet, slowly and carefully. There was no sound, at first. There was nothing, nothing at all, only a pungent, biting brightness. White nothingness. Colorless damnation. He took one step forwards, sliding his foot over the floor, stretching his arms out in front of him. Quiet. But it did not stay quiet.  
Caleb felt the threat coming, before he heard it. It was a feeling far too common, a sensation so natural to him that it took but a split second for his brain to connect the dots. The first wave of heat hit his body from behind and it brought a violent shiver, that made him convulse and his muscles tense. Oh yes. The heat always came first.  
Then he tasted it on his tongue, the bitterness of the ash. Smoke in his lungs.  
It got darker, ever so slightly. Not all of a sudden, not completely dark.  
Just enough for Caleb to open his eyes carefully. Pushing down the panic that radiated in his heart, he scanned his surroundings.  
Caleb found himself to be in a corridor, one he was certain he had never seen before in his life. Next to him were walls, so high, that he couldn’t see the ceiling and under his feet the floor turned from a smooth nothing, to a thick layer of carpeting. The walls were covered with curtains and decorated with abstract black and white drawings.  
For one moment, it was quiet. Too quiet. 

Then, a high-pitched shriek right behind him left him gasping for air. His blood froze in his veins. Without losing just one second to hesitation, Caleb started running. The screeching haunted him, this inhuman, terrifying screaming. Flickering shadows next to him showed long figures, dancing creatures of death.  
Then of course came the fire. It was not the existence of the flames in his nightmare that surprised him, obviously not. But this… this whole scene. It was new, it was different… it _felt_ different.  
Different or not. The carpet under him burst into flames.  
Flames that raked the heavy fabrics up the walls and took his sight with the blinding heat, while the creatures screamed louder, in pain. The stone under the carpet disintegrated. It crumbled and broke under his weight, forcing him to run even faster.  
Caleb’s lungs burned, his eyes watered. There was no corridor now, just screaming shadows, flames and emptiness. He was not fast enough. The decay caught up with him.  
Caleb jumped as the last stone under his feet fell away. And he fell. 

Contrary to his expectation and hopes, Caleb did not wake up. _Maybe he would never wake up again._ A thought that would have been scary, if it wouldn’t have come with a cynical echo of: _You would deserve it._ A cold, short laugh escaped his lips. The irony was painful and the truth even more so. This sequence of his nightmare was much colder than the last one and for one single moment of peace Caleb felt nothing but gratitude, because it appeared that the fire had disappeared.  
The heat was gone, the light had gone with it. This dream was cold and it was dark.  
He found himself to be in some sort of city, and while the narrow streets seemed strangely familiar to Caleb, he was sure he had never walked along them before. The houses on either side of this street stood tall and silent.  
A cold wind chased through the strange alley and filled the scenery with a thunderous roar, while heavy raindrops soaked his clothes and drummed on the top of his head. The place was deserted, not a soul to be seen, neither on the streets nor in the windows of the half-destroyed buildings. 

_You are wasting too much time, Bren._

A figure appeared in front of him. Caleb had not paid enough attention to know, if that hooded man had walked in front of him, if he had come from one of the alleys, or… not. And he could have slapped himself for that. Stupid, so stupid.  
It didn’t matter. The man before him was hiding his face, hiding his appearance under a dark robe. It didn’t matter. Cause right then, right in that moment, all of a sudden, Caleb recognized the voice. 

_I did not think you would be this slow. What happened to you? You used to be so strong. Look at you now. Schwach. Verängstigt. Pathetic._

The voice was drowning out every other sound, it was drowning out the rain and the wind and the dropping temperatures. Caleb… blinked. Slowly.  
He wanted to say something, wanted to scream, wanted to tell that man how wrong he was about him. But he couldn’t. Because deep inside Caleb knew… he knew that Trent was right. And while that realisation pierced through his mind, leaving behind a cloud of pain and confusion, it by no means came close to the pain that followed. 

_I guess you forgot your lessons, Bren. Will I have to teach them to you, again?_


	4. It made no difference

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Caleb did not keep track of how much time passed.  
> He didn't have to, there was no need for that now. It made no difference.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, this is super short again. But I felt so bad for not posting anything, things are just stressful at the moment. Sorry!  
> Also I will formate the chapters a little differently from now on, do not let that confuse you. Have fun.  
> Also there are probably typos, it is 3am and I did not edited it. Ahhhh I am horrible.

Caleb did not keep track of how much time passed. He didn't have to, there was no need for that now. It made no difference.

Seconds, minutes, hours... all those were categories that existed on a different plane of existence and only had meaning there. Not here, not in this nightmare he kept on living in.

It was hard, oh yes. It was painful. But somehow, in a weird twisted way that no one but him might ever understand, it felt nice. Well, not nice in the common sense of the word.

It wasn't nice, like sitting at a bonfire with the rest of the Nein, teasing each other and sharing food or stories. It wasn't nice, in a way that made him happy or comfortable or grateful to be alive.

It was just... something about it was familiar. It was the aching of his lungs, the crumbling pieces of his mind, the screams and the blood...even though right now, none of this was real of course.

Caleb was not very smart, not as smart as his friends sometimes made him out to be, but he was clever enough to differentiate real pain from this fictive sadism.

Real enough to hurt. Not real enough, though. Not real enough to fill his mind with endless agony, not real enough to make him beg for forgiveness, not real enough to cry.

Still, there was one thing that was worse, that made this worse than torture in the real world, outside of dream.

Usually, Caleb would have known that all of this had to end at some point. Pain was never eternal, not this kind of clear, cutting, physical kind of pain. Either it stopped, because whoever was inflicting it on him thought that it was enough or it stopped, because he died.

The last one had never happened to him, but it was always an option he had kept in his mind. Just in case. This time he wasn't sure if he could even die.

What if he died already and this was just hell?

In addition to that, there was one other thing that confused Caleb. He didn't know _why_ this was happening. In the past, whenever his teacher had disciplined him, or rather abused him under the cloak of discipline, there had been a reason. Not always a good one. Sometimes it was punishment, sometimes it was experiments, but it was always for _something._ No one had bothered to make up some reasoning this time. And Caleb didn't get it.

The figure of Trent Ikithon was standing over him, with soft words and harsh lies, and Caleb _didn't understand it._ What good was this going to do?

Caleb had a lot of unflattering opinions about Ikithon, but never had he thought that is former teacher could be this stupid.

There was no way, Ikithon could truly be behind this? What would he be torturing Caleb for, if he had so many, so much more efficient ways to either get his student back in line or eliminate him as an enemy. The confusion, mixing in with the pain and his fear seemed to create an endless feeling of suffering. But it seemed like even in this world, one Caleb was sure existed somewhere between his usual nightmares and reality, pain was never eternal.

At the very least, it wasn't this time.

Caleb woke up.

His mind found its way back to his body slowly and the weight of it pushed him down harder to the ground with every second, until his back hurt. There was a warm, purring weight against his side, taking slow and calm breaths. Frumpkin.

And then there was the feeling of someone carefully running their fingers through his hair.

Caleb gave himself a moment to collect his thoughts. What had happened to him?

He tried to go back, reliving the past few days, but nothing suspicious popped out to him. It mostly had been travel, riding in the back of the cart, reading, camping outside. No fights, no mysterious meetings with strangers. He still felt the weight of his necklace against his chest.

Everything seemed... fine. Well, not fine. But normal.

Clearly though, things were not normal. He must have missed something. This was bad. Very bad.

Caleb was not allowed to miss things like this, missing details that could endanger his life or the lives of his friends. What to do now?

His eyelids fluttered open and all he saw was darkness. Okay, good, it was still the same night. This was good. Right?

No voice, for now. No confusion, apart from the rational one. Good. He too another minute, to count back the seconds from 60 to 1 and then he turned his head.

“Caleb!”

Nott's voice hit his ear and she appeared in his vision.

“You're awake.”

She helped him to sit up and he looked around but his human eyes were almost blind in the darkness. He made out the campfire, trees and humanoid shadows of the Nein.

They all seemed to be awake, sitting together, talking to each other in quiet murmurs. Even without having to see it, he could sense their eyes piercing him from a distance. His fingers found the edges of the bandages. Caleb didn't enjoy this situation. He had to fix it, as fast as possible, so that they could all just move on.

“Caleb? Caleeeb?”

Nott. Right. She was waving her hands in front of his face. Caleb blinked his sorrow away.  
“Ja. Ja, I can hear you.”

Nott smiled at him, with some sort of relief. He wasn't sure how she was able to feel any kind of relief right now, but he was happy she did. What to do now?

He saw one of the silhouettes stand up and walk over to him and Nott. The light step in the walk and the dress, waving in the wind, told him who it was, before he heard Jesters: “Cayyyleeeb! How are you feeling? I mean, obviously not too great, but like, apart from that? Are you okay?”

“Ja. I'm fine, Jester.”

Jester kneeled down in front of him. Her smile was as friendly as ever, but a hint of worry laid over the way she frowned her eyebrows.

“I would like to try to cast something on you, if that is okay? We could totally try different things, like, if restoration doesn't work, I could also try dispel magic, and oh Cayyylebb, can I try to help you, please? I am sure it will work.”

Caleb was not terrible enthusiastic about those ideas, but what choice did he have? So he just nodded. Jester's smile grew a little wider, a little more honest.  
“Great!”

She took his hands into hers and he felt the familiar feeling of her magic, rushing over him. For a moment, everyone stayed quiet.  
“Well?”, Nott wanted to know, “Did it work?”

Good question, Caleb thought. Did it?


End file.
